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| Bollywood in Beijing | | WTO ruling can open doors for Indians too |
| Business Standard / New Delhi Dec 29, 2009, 00:11 IST |
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Last week’s ruling of the appellate court of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) opening China’s doors wider to entertainment exports from the United States can also boost Indian cinema’s markets in China. The WTO appellate court has upheld an earlier ruling that China has been too restrictive in its import policies with respect to foreign music, cinema, literature and theatre. The WTO dispute settlement body will have to confirm this decision within 30 days after which China gets another 30 days to reply on how it proposes to respond to the ruling. If China falls in line with WTO discipline, it will have to adopt a more liberal import policy with respect to literature, film, music and other entertainment products, including mobile phone ring tones. China could still use its censor boards to restrict imports, and it can impose some ceiling on total imports, but it cannot any longer shut out foreign entertainment and literature from its markets.
While the WTO ruling is in response to a US complaint, it should be obvious that India would have a huge interest in the matter. Though India’s entertainment and publishing industry is nowhere near as big as that of the United States, with Walt Disney studios alone having revenues twice as much as the entire Indian film industry, the prospect of exporting to China should be welcomed. At present, very few Indian films are able to make it into the Chinese market. Indian diplomats and the entertainment industry have been knocking at closed doors. With great effort, India managed to get the film Lagaan commercially released in China, but few others have made it without difficulty. The popular success of the few Indian films that have made it into China shows that there is a potentially large market for Indian entertainment exports in China.
The WTO ruling serves to show the wisdom of getting trade in entertainment products and publishing under multilateral discipline. When this was originally proposed by the United States in 1994, many in India opposed the proposal on the grounds that this would result in western cultural imperialism. The growth of the Indian entertainment industry in the past decade shows that rather than fear invasion from outside, Indian entertainment should be better prepared to go global. In 2008, the Indian entertainment industry was estimated to be about Rs 58,400 crore. It is forecast to grow at the annual rate of 12.5 per cent to an estimated Rs 1,05,200 crore by 2013. While Hollywood exports 50 per cent of its total entertainment output, Bollywood is estimated to export only 20 per cent of its output. The global market for Bollywood is almost entirely accounted for by overseas Indians. With some creativity and imagination, the Indian publishing and entertainment industry can easily tap the wider global market. The opening up of the Chinese market should, therefore, be viewed with greater interest in India than has been the case so far. For China, transparent and faithful adherence to the WTO ruling would be a test of its commitment to become a more open society.
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